Time to Scare You Again

It has been awhile since we have talked about global warming and overall climate change. There are lots of areas that have upcoming problems....some closer than others. Folks in New York and Florida anywhere near the ocean may want to consider selling before too long.

Real Climate Change Kinda Sucks, Don't It?

• There are those who think climate change is not real: they are called Republicans.
• The most idiotic of them seem to come from Oklahoma and Kentucky - two states that will vanish in a blaze before any ocean overtakes them such as Florida and Louisiana  needs to worry about. 
• There are those who think climate change doesn't hurt anything: they are called American citizens.
• There are those who think climate change is solvable politically: they are called Democrats.
• There are those who know climate change is not only factual, but serious and here right now: they are called scientists.
• There are those who are intelligent voters and vote according to facts and not ideology: they are called Independents.

Which group are you in?  How will you vote?
 
It is getting serious folks, I probably won't live to see the real outcome of all this but my daughter or her children will...when will we finally make a stand...for humankind?

And Now For Something Completely Different

Sometimes I think Thomas Friedman gets to have all the fun!

Just Don't Talk About the Weather

This is a fairly balanced view of the strange weather the country has been having the last couple of years.  In reality, getting "stuck" in a weather pattern for an extended period of time or unusual patterns as we have been seeing is one of the primary predictions of those who study global climate change.  It should be no surprise that we are seeing longer, sustained storm systems since via altering the temperature of the planet, humanity has altered the all-important weather driver, the jetstream.

So...rather than just talking about the weather, get your lazy, ignorant Congressional representatives to do something, and get the US onboard with international efforts to reduce pollutants and the general spewing of hydrocarbons into the atmosphere, relying on the 1920s attitude of "they just blow away".

Kudos to the LA Times

Finally, a respectable news organization is calling an end to the climate-change denier bunk that is published not only in letters to the editor, but all over the Internet (always 'anonymously' of course) as "comments" whenever climate change is mentioned.

If you haven't been following the science (or just paying attention to the mindless drivel of cable news channels) you might not know that there is no real controversy left among actual practicing scientists that have knowledge of climatology....and you know that other science stuff. 

Unlike the "impressive" list of "distinguished scientists" that Senator James Inhofe (Oklahoma) waved in front of a hearing.  Hmm...seems to be a lot of Doctorates on here...of English, Philosophy, Mathematics....and oh yes, a bunch of TV "weather personalities" we will say to be kind.

The LA Times recently declared:

Saying "there's no sign humans have caused climate change" is not stating an opinion, it's asserting a factual inaccuracy.

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/opinion-la/la-ol-climate-change-letters-20131008,0,871615.story#ixzz2lQn2ukyp

Good Luck to the Aussies

May a fair wind blow the other way (and some rain be delivered) to help in your fight with some massive fires that are getting worse. 

If any American reading this has had the good fortune to spend any time in Australia as I did several years ago, you know what a friendly, warm, welcoming, strong and versatile people they are.   They have been hit with some real bad droughts and fires in recent years and are perhaps the first "first world" country to suffer the effects of global warming.

A Glimpse of Our Future?

Anyone who is not thinking these days at least part time about climate change is just not thinking (or is a member of a political party).

It turns out that all of the hand-wringing about the precious jobs and economy has been decided -- George II and his henchmen destroyed the economy without a thought...and all those who said 'global warming' (as it was then called) was phony, have since been proved wrong on all fronts.  We on earth are now warmer, with more unpredictable weather patterns, and more poison in the air than anytime in recorded history.

Watch Could Agriculture Bloom in the Desert? on PBS. See more from PBS NewsHour.

The Globalness of Corruption

Interesting and somewhat frustrating TED Talk on the universality of corruption and the difficulty of fighting it when forces like large banks and multi-national corporations like oil and gas companies are willing key players.  It should also be a sobering note to Americans in particular what their gluttonous appetite for wasting energy has done to other people around the world.

Enjoy That Steak

It has been known for some time that food production is yet another looming catastrophe for the world.  Climate change, plus the wasteful practices of the western world (the US throws away or never harvests almost half of its food,  and the rest of the world is not much better) is a major part of the problem. 

But it turns out the biggest problem may be prosperity -- with more countries successfully raising their living standards, the tendency is to migrate toward more animal-origin food sources.  This article talks about research in one particular area -- substitutes for chicken eggs.

In its typically informative and fact-based manner, PBS has formed a joint effort with Public Radio International's Center for Investigative Reporting to study what else is being done about the problem.

Thanks "Free Press" !

With all the whooping about press rights and freedoms in the wake of the wrongheaded AP phone subpoenas...I can't help but think that I would be a lot more passionate about it if the press had shown any tendency in the past fifteen years to actually do the duty that the Constitution is supposed to guarantee that they have the ability to do. 

Instead, we have a press that panders...increasingly to ratings and the non-stories that drive them.  The worst president in US history (George II) got an essentially free pass as he and his minions dissected the Constitution for their own gain, destroyed American credibility abroad, and just for good measure destroyed the American economy as well.

The press has also ignored (not sexy enough I guess) the whole topic of the climate change that has been happening all around us.  

It's been awhile since we had a "bad climate news" Monday, so lets have one on Friday!  Happy thinking...

Drowning Our History

It is expected that with climate change trends (particularly the unprecedented upward rise in overall temperatures) that Jamestown, the birthplace of America will be underwater by the end of the century. 

That is posing some unprecedented quandaries for researchers and archaeologists.  One of them I just learned about reading and listening to this excellent NPR report on the subject - that it has been a common protocol for archaeologists to purposely leave artifacts buried at known sites, so that future archaeologists can use better technology to learn even more.  But if your site is going to disappear????

BTW, I think All Things Considered (where this report was aired) is one of the best, most comprehensive, balanced and informative programs on NPR.  I try and catch it whenever I can.

I DON'T think this is a subject you will ever hear about on Fox News!!!

The False Expectations of Tar Sand Oil

There are other costs to the "tar sands" oil reserves in addition to the fact that they are extremely expensive (the most expensive form of oil to date to make usable) and the simple fact that for the Keystone Pipeline -- most of that oil is being shipped across prime US agricultural land simply to get onto the world oil market. This TED Talk is worth listening to and thinking about:

Who Knew...

...that poop and pee were so important? 

Seriously, here is another jaw-dropping TED Talk from this year's just concluded TED Conference.  I have said elsewhere that one of the cool things about science is the uncertainty. Today's proven and accepted idea is only good until...the next better one comes along.   This is something that the science-ignorant masses do not "get", nor do the religious zealots but it is a strength that they cannot match.

This gentleman is soft-spoken, but he brings the courage and conviction of having been proven wrong before...and by experiencing the crucible of patient, long-term experimentation and study.   Truly an amazing idea and a very effective talk.


   

The Cost of "Good Oil"

The oil from Canadian tar sands is seen by the uninformed as "good" oil, primarily because it is a friendly country and we don't have to extract it with thousands of American deaths in war. 

However, as a recent study shows it is definitely not obtained without a price.  We get to drive around in single-occupancy huge motor vehicles awhile longer, and the Canadians get some short-term money.  However the long-term costs may be around for awhile, and could spread to the US if the Keystone pipeline is built across America's heartland and a major aquifer, so the oil can be put onto the much more lucrative world market.   

"Like Manhattan Breaking Apart Before Your Eyes"

The huge loss of the ice at the North and South poles of the earth is going to have a profound (and none too pleasant effect) on the earth's climate.   The only question is when. 

The new documentary 'Chasing Ice' is one I definitely need to see - this clip is from the film:

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